Star Trek Rocks

Star Trek brings the house down as you can feel the legacy in every scene. It just rocks. It kicks ass.

Review: Star Trek

First of all, going back to the characters’ youths gives the filmmakers a chance to show the rich worlds on which they lived. Both future Earth and Vulcan feel lived in, not just balls in space that get referred to sometimes. The lives on these planets are demonstrable in the kids who live and play on them.

The rhythm and timing of the dialogue is so sharp. They work all the phrases you want to hear into the story so they make sense, but give you the moments you want. When the characters tell little asides, it’s great Trek banter. The story has all the impact of the social and moral issues in which Star Trek deals. It’s really emotional too.

Oh my God, Bones is awesome. Everyone does their characters right and I hate to play favorites, but something about Karl Urban’s “Bones” McCoy is just super gripping. He nails the characteristics and feels like a real person who would be onboard a space ship. Not a monotone “this is the language of future technology” but a real guy who might go, “What the F?” I’ve got to compliment Chris Pine’s posture in the chair too. That is a whole lot of acting with just a reclined form.

The celebrity cameos are not distracting at all. In fact, they populate the world with credibility. The new cast gets to invent what they need to, but in the important plot-forwarding roles, they get people we recognize so we take it seriously, not like they’re just some affordable day player.

The space battles still have the feel of submarines, just with more ‘splosions, lasers, shaking cameras, stumbling and falling around. By the way, this is an example of good CGI. The futuristic things going on in the backgrounds look like they are part of the world.

The film brings familiarity to the extraordinary world that may have alienated some people in its most hardcore form. In this case, the shaky cam style is okay because it’s familiar. It’s bringing this story of a distant future with the sensibility of the distant past into a familiar storytelling mechanism. And it’s awesome, but to be a little bit more pretentious, the tilted angles make the ship look more dynamic and flowing, and the light flaring at the camera feel like the Enterprise is giving off real energy.

Look, the scenario that puts third year cadets in positions of command on a starship is contrived, but it follows the rules and gives us what we want. They explain some backstory and sci-fi phenomenon but that also gives them a chance for a mind meld. Sometimes they get to the point of a scene fast when they could develop it more, but it’s so juicy you just get a quick fix of the heart of the matter.

What make Star Trek so special are all the specific moments, which I won’t spoil. So let’s talk again after you see it so we can analyze how the new film handled Trek tradition with its new reinvention.